SSR Mining, owner of the Çöpler gold mine in Turkey, said the body of one of its missing personnel has been recovered from the Manganese Pit following a February 13 heap leach slip as efforts to find the others continue.
CEO Rod Antal said that its priority since the date of the event has been the recovery of all nine of their colleagues. The discovery of the body at the pit was made and confirmed on April 5.
“Our thoughts continue to be with all of the impacted families. The search for our missing colleagues continues, with over 4 million tonnes of displaced material removed to date from the Sabırlı Valley, Manganese Pit and heap leach pad,” the company said.
SSR said in late February, just a week after the incident, that the mine’s environmental permit had been revoked.
Planning for near-term remediation efforts has begun at the direction of government officials, with an initial focus on removing heap leach material from the Sabirli Valley and relocating it to a permanent storage location.
The Turkish Ministry of the Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change has been regularly monitoring the surface water, groundwater, soil, and air quality in the region since Feb. 13. To date, the ministry has reported that all results have been negative with respect to potential contamination in the locations being monitored.
Çöpler, 80% SSR-owned, is part of the Çöpler District in east-central Turkey in the Erzincan Province, approximately 1,100 kilometers southeast from Istanbul and 550 km east from Ankara.
Source: ssrmining.com